| 21. |
- Ponsot, Elodie, 1973-, et al.
(författare)
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Skeletal muscle telomere length is not impaired in healthy physically active old women and men
- 2008
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Ingår i: Muscle and Nerve. - : Wiley. - 0148-639X .- 1097-4598. ; 37:4, s. 467-472
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We have previously shown that the number of satellite cells is lower in old than young men and women. The aim of this study was to further explore the effects of aging on the regenerative potential of skeletal muscle in 16 young and 26 old men and women with comparable physical activity level (young, 25 +/- 4 years; old, 75 +/- 4 years). Mean and minimum telomere lengths were determined using Southern blot analyses on biopsies obtained from the tibialis anterior muscle. There were no significant age or gender effects on mean and minimal telomeric lengths, suggesting that the replicative potential in the remaining satellite cells in the tibialis anterior muscle is not impaired with increasing age and the existence of in vivo regulatory mechanisms allowing the maintenance of telomere length. These results imply that moderate physical activity regularly performed by old subjects is not associated with accelerated telomere loss.
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| 22. |
- Munthe, Christian, 1962
(författare)
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Informed Consent and Quality of Available Information
- 1998
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Ingår i: Fourth World Congress of the International Association of Bioethics, Tokyo, November 4-7, 1998.
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Standard versions of the requirement of informed consent state that patients who are offered to enter a clinical trial of a medical procedure should be informed about risks and possible benefits of this procedure (compared to available alternatives) in order to facilitate a rational decision whether or not to participate. However, in many real cases where new medical procedures are to be clinically tested for the first time the information available for such communication to prospective patients is very scarce, vague and/or uncertain. This phenomenon is illustrated by the clinical introduction of new procedures in reproductive medicine, such as preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD). Regarding such procedures, it has ben argued that, in such cases, the quality of the available information may be too low for the obtaining of informed consent to be possible, even if it is successfully communicated. Others, instead, holds that informed consent may always be obtained regardless of the quality of the available information. Unfortunately, the standard litterature on informed consent give no clue as to which of these interpretations is correct. This issue is explored by connecting the concept of informed consent to ethical ideas of respect for autonomy and ideas of rational decision making. It is argued, first, that low quality of available information regarding the risks and possible benefits of a medical procedure may indeed make the obtaining of informed consent from patients to undergo this procedure impossible even in theory. However, it is also argued that whether or not this is the case must be relativized to the actual needs and desires of individual patients. Thus, regarding one and the same procedure, informed consent may be impossible to obtain from some patients due to the low quality of the available information regarding this procedure, but still be possible to obtain from other patients.
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| 23. |
- Munthe, Christian, 1962
(författare)
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Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis: Ethical Aspects
- 2006
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Ingår i: Encyclopedia of Life Sciences. - Chichester, UK : John Wiley & Sons.
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Bokkapitel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In preimplantation genetic diagnosis, genetic traits of embryos are detected before the initiation of pregnancy. Although tampering with embryos is morally controversial, this procedure may seem to reduce ethical problems in prenatal diagnosis by offering the possibility of selecting offspring, on the basis of genetic information, more efficiently and without any need to consider abortion. However, counseling of patients becomes more complicated, and the procedure may seem to make the outside influence of their decisions easier to both achieve and justify. As a consequence, preimplantation genetic diagnosis raises concerns about the connection between the preselection of children on genetic grounds and the discrimination of disabled people. Moreover, it introduces the new ethical problem of whether or not the selection of future children on the basis of nonpathological traits should be acceptable practice.
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| 24. |
- Munthe, Christian, 1962
(författare)
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Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis: Ethical Aspects
- 2007
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Ingår i: Encyclopedia of Life Sciences. - Chichester, UK : John Wiley & Sons. - 9780470066515
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Bokkapitel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In preimplantation genetic diagnosis, genetic traits of embryos are detected before the initiation of pregnancy. Although tampering with embryos is morally controversial, this procedure may seem to reduce ethical problems in prenatal diagnosis by offering the possibility of selecting offspring, on the basis of genetic information, more efficiently and without any need to consider abortion. However, counseling of patients becomes more complicated, and the procedure may seem to make the outside influence of their decisions easier to both achieve and justify. As a consequence, preimplantation genetic diagnosis raises concerns about the connection between the preselection of children on genetic grounds and the discrimination of disabled people. Moreover, it introduces the new ethical problem of whether or not the selection of future children on the basis of nonpathological traits should be acceptable practice.
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| 25. |
- Kadi, Fawzi, et al.
(författare)
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Satellite cells and myonuclei in young and elderly women and men
- 2004
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Ingår i: Muscle and Nerve. - : Wiley. - 0148-639X .- 1097-4598. ; 29:1, s. 120-127
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The overall aim of this study was to assess the effects of aging on the satellite cell population. Muscle biopsies were taken from the tibialis anterior muscle of healthy, moderately active young (age range, 20-32 years; n = 31) and elderly (age range, 70-83 years; n = 27) women and men with comparable physical activity pattern. Satellite cells and myonuclei were visualized using a monoclonal antibody against neural cell adhesion molecule and counterstained with Mayer's hematoxylin. An average of 211 (range, 192-241) muscle fibers were examined for each individual. Compared with the young women and men, the elderly subjects had a significantly lower (P < 0.011) number of satellite cells per muscle fiber but a significantly higher (P < 0.004) number of myonuclei per muscle fiber. The number of satellite cells relative to the total number of nuclei [satellite cells/(myonuclei + satellite cells)] was significantly lower in the elderly than in the young women and men. These results imply that a reduction in the satellite cell population occurs as a result of increasing age in healthy men and women.
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| 26. |
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| 27. |
- Follér, Maj-Lis, 1946
(författare)
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Interactions between global processes and local health problems. A human ecology approach to health among indigenous groups in the Amazon
- 2001
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Ingår i: Cadernos de Saúde Pública (Reports in public health). - 0102-311X. ; 17:supplement, s. 116-126
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This article deals with methodological issues and how to link global processes - social and ecological - with environmental changes and human health in local communities. The discussion concerns how interdisciplinary approaches can help us find tools to develop new knowledge. Scientific knowledge and local knowledge are not seen as opposite epistemological forms, but as socially and culturally constructed. Power and social legitimacy have to be included when analyzing how to deal with the interaction between global processes and local environmental change and the health/disease interface.
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| 28. |
- Saulo, Eleonor C., et al.
(författare)
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Willingness and ability to pay for artemisinin-based combination therapy in rural Tanzania
- 2008
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Ingår i: Malaria Journal. - London : BioMed Central. - 1475-2875 .- 1475-2875. ; 7, s. 227-
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The aim of this study was to analyse willingness to pay (WTP) and ability to pay (ATP) for ACT for children below five years of age in a rural setting in Tanzania before the introduction of artemisinin-based combination therapy (ACT) as first-line treatment for uncomplicated malaria. Socio-economic factors associated with WTP and expectations on anti-malaria drugs, including ACT, were also explored.MethodsStructured interviews and focus group discussions were held with mothers, household heads, health-care workers and village leaders in Ishozi, Gera and Ishunju wards in north-west Tanzania in 2004. Contingent valuation method (CVM) was used with "take-it-or-leave-it" as the eliciting method, expressed as WTP for a full course of ACT for a child and households' opportunity cost of ACT was used to assess ATP. The study included descriptive analyses with multivariate adjustment for potential confounding factors.ResultsAmong 265 mothers and household heads, 244 (92%, CI = 88%–95%) were willing to pay Tanzanian Shillings (TSh) 500 (US$ 0.46) for a child's dose of ACT, but only 55% (49%–61%) were willing to pay more than TSh 500. Mothers were more often willing to pay than male household heads (adjusted odds ratio = 2.1, CI = 1.2–3.6). Socio-economic status had no significant effect on WTP. The median annual non-subsidized ACT cost for clinical malaria episodes in an average household was calculated as US$ 6.0, which would represent 0.9% of the average total consumption expenditures as estimated from official data in 2001. The cost of non-subsidized ACT represented 7.0% of reported total annual expenditure on food and 33.0% of total annual expenditure on health care."Rapid effect," "no adverse effect" and "inexpensive" were the most desired features of an anti-malarial drug.ConclusionWTP for ACT in this study was less than its real cost and a subsidy is, therefore, needed to enable its equitable affordability. The decision taken in Tanzania to subsidize Coartem® fully at governmental health care facilities and at a consumer price of TSh 300–500 (US$ 0.28–0.46) at special designated shops through the programme of Accredited Drug Dispensing Outlets (ADDOs) appears to be well founded.
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| 29. |
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| 30. |
- Ali, Magdi M. M., et al.
(författare)
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Fc gamma RIIa (CD32) polymorphism and onchocercal skin disease : implications for the development of severe reactive onchodermatitis (ROD)
- 2007
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Ingår i: American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. - Lawrence, Kans. : American society of tropical medicine and hygiene. - 0002-9637 .- 1476-1645. ; 77:6, s. 1074-8
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The pathologic manifestations of Onchocerca volvulus infection depend on the interplay between the host and the parasite. A genetic single nucleotide polymorphism in the Fc gamma RIIa gene, resulting in arginine (R) or histidine (H) at position 131, affects the binding to the different IgG subclasses and may influence the clinical variations seen in onchocerciasis. This study investigated the relationship between this polymorphism and disease outcome. Fc gamma RIIa genotyping was performed on clinically characterized onchocerciasis patients (N = 100) and healthy controls (N = 74). Fc gamma RIIa genotype R/R131 frequencies were significantly higher among patients with severe dermatopathology (P < 0.001). Increased risk of developing this form was mostly associated with one tribe (Masalit) (OR = 3.2, 95% CI 1-9.9, P = 0.042). The H131 allele was found to be significantly associated with a reduced risk of having the severe form of the disease (adjusted OR = 0.26, 95% CI = 0.13-0.46, P < 0.001). Our findings suggest that the polymorphism influences the clinical outcome of onchocerciasis.
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